Solamh

[AuntDympna]

Inspired by the thread on Sullivan, I'm wondering what people think of this Irish / Scots Gaelic name. It's used to mean Solomon in the bible. As a functional word means prompt, ready, quick, dexterous.
The genitive form is Solaimh or Solmhan.

@mathanxiety I’m Irish and I pronounce the last sound of hollow as an ‘o’. No matter how many times I say Solamh or the mh sound, I can’t get it to resemble hollow. Wrecking my head now

Just give your kid a name people don't have to ask how to pronounce.

I quite like Suleiman . Which is the Arabic version.

[quote Anoisagusaris]@mathanxiety I’m Irish and I pronounce the last sound of hollow as an ‘o’. No matter how many times I say Solamh or the mh sound, I can’t get it to resemble hollow. Wrecking my head now [/quote]
How do you say "samhradh"? Do you say "savra"? I say "sowroo".

OP Nope
It's a swing and a miss.

www.teanglann.ie/ga/fuaim/Ollamh

This has the pronunciation of "ollamh" in three dialects. "Solamh" is the same with an s at the start. Single or double l makes no difference.

@AuntDympna I would say something like ‘sow-ra’. My Irish is rusty and was never brilliant in school.

Which is obviously not how I pronounce the mh in Solamh or how I pronounce hollow 🤣

Not knowing how to pronounce it with my clumsy English tongue, my mind Immediately went to Salome, the head on a plate and the gristly Oscar Wilde play.

@AuntDympna madness to use this! Even the Irish people on the thread can’t agree!

For me Lamh is pronounced Law-ve so I would pronounce So-Law-ve so I disagree with both your pronunciations!!

I’m from Ulster.

I agree with mathanxiety that the o in Solamh is a different vowel sound to the o's in olive or hollow.
It's probably better represented by a u in English than by an o...

I prefer Solomon, which I really like. Think you’d get a lot of pronunciation issues with this and he’d end up getting called solemn a lot. Partly because of the spelling of his name but mostly because he’s just had to explain his name for the five millionth time at Starbucks.

The Irish for sullivan is Súilleabháin. Pronounced sull-eh-vawn. I've never seen your version and I went to school with several people with the surname.

@romdowa "Solamh" is the translation for Solomon in the Bible. It's in Dinneen's dictionary. It's not ever said to be the origin of Súilleabháin or Sullivan, so you wouldn't have seen it.

@ConasAtaTu1 "lawve" would be right for lámh (hand) - in Connacht and Munster. In Ulster "lámh" is "low", like English "allow". "Lamh" without an accent isn't a word, but in ollamh (professor) and solamh (prompt, quick) the stress is on the first syllable, just like in solemn.
You might be from Ulster but your Irish isn't - "conas atá tú?" is a Munster greeting. In Ulster it's "cad é mar atá tú?"

I'm Irish and would guess Sul-av. I think it's quite nice. Reminds me of the word for light in Irish.

@Anoisagusaris I was just panicking thinking I have never heard samhradh with a v, but teanglann has it sounding like sow-ra in all dialects, phew.

The fact that this thread reads like an lecture in pronunciation is probably exactly why you shouldn't choose this name. It's unfair to do this to a child - even though I actually quite like one of the versions of the pronunciations.

Maybe use it as a middle name if you can't not have it?

[quote AuntDympna]@ConasAtaTu1 "lawve" would be right for lámh (hand) - in Connacht and Munster. In Ulster "lámh" is "low", like English "allow". "Lamh" without an accent isn't a word, but in ollamh (professor) and solamh (prompt, quick) the stress is on the first syllable, just like in solemn.
You might be from Ulster but your Irish isn't - "conas atá tú?" is a Munster greeting. In Ulster it's "cad é mar atá tú?"[/quote]
Thanks for the Irish lesson. I will pass it on to my former Irish teacher - fluent Irish speaker who now runs the local gaelscoil. You do realise the Irish books we learn in school don’t differ by region? Hence my username being a valid Irish phrase regardless of where I learnt Irish.

I hope you are writing this all down so when you give your son this ridiculous name he can parrot it to every person he meets who can’t pronounce his name. Maybe you can provide some lore snarky examples of how you know better than someone what they were taught in school.

I’m sure he will be the life and soul of new gatherings! Best of luck to little olive/hollow/solawve

Olive and hollow don't rhyme at all. 🤦🏻‍♀️

I would have no idea how to pronounce. Having said that I would get used to it if I knew the child

To a non-Scots eye it looks like random letters put together.

Go with Solomon.

@conasatatu1
I didn't mean to be "snarky". I'm very sorry if it came across like that. The thing is there are two valid pronunciations of this name and you are proposing a third. It's confusing people who are saying "Irish people do not agree". I've pointed out a neutral, reliable source, teanglann, where you can listen to the pronunciation by region, using the link upthread. Whatever you were taught in school, you can check it on there.
My deepest apologies once again for seeming sharp. I'm here for the fun, I just like this name.

Prefer Solomon

Conas atá tú?" is a Munster greeting.

I think 'Conas atá tú' is standard Irish rather than Munster Irish, AuntDympna, so it's taught in most schools as ConasAtaTu1 says.
In the Kerry gaeltacht at least, 'how are you?' is 'Conas tann tú?' or sometimes 'Conas taoi?'

@LizzieAnt

I agree with mathanxiety that the o in Solamh is a different vowel sound to the o's in olive or hollow. It's probably better represented by a u in English than by an o...

I'll add to my earlier comment by saying that the ow of hollow doesn't represent the second syllable of Solamh as said in an Ulster accent either.

I like Solamh actually, and would never have considered it before. It has a gentle sound and would probably cause less confusion in Ireland than it has on here. But I don't think it's really said like either olive or hollow - not in my accent at least - so that's a little bit of a misrepresentation. The teanglann link is good, it does rhyme with ollamh. Teanglann.ie is so useful, I love it